Beyond belief: Doomsday religion

When the Harold Camping “Judgment Day” billboards started popping up around the Bay Area, I felt a mix of humor and disgust. I shook my head when I learned that Camping was a neighbor of mine in the East End of Alameda, and when Judgment Day passed without any visible judgment, I snickered as I walked past his tightly shuttered house.

Like many charismatic spiritual leaders before him, Camping convinced seekers to stake everything on what turned out to be his mistaken interpretation of the truth. According to his Family Radio broadcasts, the Rapture would take place on May 21, 2011 and approximately 2.8 percent of the population would immediately ascend to Heaven. The rest of us would live on Earth for a hellish five months of plagues and starvation before God finally wiped us off the map. Camping publicized the prediction in numerous countries and spent an estimated $5 million on advertising in 2011 (a fraction of the money his followers have donated since he started broadcasting in the late 1950s).

Of course, no Apocalyptic activity occurred on the predicted date, and Camping was left to defend all manner of accusations. But staying on Earth has worked out okay for him. He still lives on Gibbons Drive in Alameda, with a reported net worth of more than $75 million. His followers? Not so much. (Attempts to contact Camping and the organization were unsuccessful.)

Camping is not the first person to claim to know the mind of God or to profit from fear, and he bears responsibly for the chaos has he created. But his adult followers? Did they not get what they deserved? It is tempting to assume that Family Radio fans – people who relied so wholeheartedly on the arrogant ravings of a radio evangelist – are either crazy or dim-witted. But they’re not. I could easily have been one of them.